All Nonprofit Marketing and Fundraising Articles
Hunter Interview – Dave the Development Director
Dave asks, "Why do you want to work at a nonprofit?" Hunter replies, "I have extensive experience raising funds." "What experience?" Dave asks. "I did a Go Fund Me for a missions trip to Africa." Hunter replies. Dave asks, "What did you do in Africa?" Hunter says, "I changed a kid's life by giving him hope."
Episode 008 – How Do I Create a Sense of Urgency in My Appeals?
Creating a sense of urgency in your appeal messaging will help move readers to become donors. What if you have a difficult time creating a sense of urgency? In episode 8 of Nonprofit Answers, Rob asks a question about how to create urgency in his appeals for a women's shelter.
Accounting Error – Dave the Development Director
"Looks like we have an accounting error snd we will be $250,000 short," said Frank, the CFO. Julie, a board member, replies, "That's ok, we will just ask Dave to raise the money." "Fundraising is so easy." Gerrish, the Board Chairman, responds.
100 More Email Appeal Subject Lines
A great subject line can be the difference between catching the recipient's attention to open your email or to be unceremoniously tossed into the trash or simply ignored. What makes a subject line stand out? It needs to be concise. The best subject lines are between 3 and 6 words in length. You don't have to explain the entire email in
8 Ways to Reactivate Unresponsive Email Addresses
Do you have people on your email list who haven't interacted with your organization in some time? Do you want to learn how you can save these people and reactivate them to continue wanting to receive your emails? Let's explore 8 steps the organization can take to reactivate these people, or decide what to do with them if they still
Episode 007 – My Executive Director Keeps Editing Out Fundraising Best Practices
Do you have someone who edits out fundraising best practice from your appeals? Someone who doesn't like the urgency, postscripts, hyphens, folksy language, or handwritten notes? Is your fundraising suffering because of it? In episode 7, Jeremy answers a question from Julia about how to handle an Executive Director who doesn't understand fundraising and is undermining her efforts.
Telemarketing – Dave the Development Director
"Hey Dave, we had one complaint about your telemarketing campaign. Can you cancel that?" said Nixon, the Customer Service Manager. Dave replies, "That's $200,000 of our annual revenue." "It's bothering our donors, Dave. Just ask a major donor to give $200,000." Nixon responds. Nixon walks away thinking "I'm good at this fundraising thing."
Why Donors Give: In Exchange for a Premium
Different donors give for different reasons. Successful fundraising is driven by your nonprofit organization appealing to the recipient’s reasons for giving. Consider all the ways you can leverage storytelling, imagery, and emotion in your emails. The motivation for donating is as diverse as your recipients, but research suggests most people fall into one of several categories. A primary goal as
Episode 006 – Why Don’t My Emails Perform As Well As My Direct Mail?
Direct mail is not dead. Far from it, direct mail still performs well if you have a good strategy behind it. Many nonprofits are transitioning more investment into digital but aren't seeing the return in email that they've seen in direct mail. Today, we're going to talk through the five Cs of successful email appeals, then we have a question from Marcy about why her emails don't perform as well as her direct mail does.
Rewrite Fundraising Letter – Dave the Development Director
"Dave, I need you to rewrite this fundraising letter and remove all of the language that makes us look like we need the donor's money," said Wendy, the Executive Director. Dave replies, "We'll lose donations doing that." "I also need you to raise 10% more than your goal, thanks." Wendy responds.
Nonprofit Thank You Video Script
Videos are a powerful relationship building tool. A technique that can help your nonprofit quickly begin building a relationship with your donor is to create a personalized thank you video. This creative way of expressing gratitude to your donor communicates how much you care. There are a number of platforms that help facilitate the personalized video process. The platforms allow
Episode 005 – What to Do With 25,000 Email Addresses a Partner Offered Us?
Karen's organization has a partner who offered them a list of 25,000 email addresses. Her boss wants to just add them to their email service provider, but Karen doesn't agree. In episode 5, Jeremy gives Karen advice as to how to answer her boss and what to do with the opportunity.